Goodbye #03

A Memory of My Uncle.

Loss is never an easy thing. We are constantly confronted with our hurt, another’s, and the world’s. When death arrives at our doorstep there are mixed emotions. Sometimes relief, sometimes wailing, sometimes deep celebration and loss. Often, its arrival bears some combination of all of these.

Growing up in the inheritance of George Tannis, family life was complicated. In our Syrian Orthodox tradition, it is often the patriarch we refence for political and/or commercial interest. It took me years later, as I delved deeper into my Zarbatany side, that I came to realise the personal and familial network was often held together by tenacious women. That, however, is not part of this story of memory.

My Uncle Ralph, and his siblings, were shaped by the legacy of George Tannis. My own birth situation was influenced by these Lebanese ways of knowing, and, as with my elders, knowing love was not something that was necessarily experienced through our patriarch. As the eldest grandson of George, in normal times, that would have carried with it some import, but my father, whom I know of, but have never known, was … well … it’s complicated.

So, into this family, I was born. A group of people intensely intelligent, passionate, and, often, wrestling with a sense of belonging, a longing to be loved and to love. Coming from this complicated family, my first clear memory is what I will share with you.

My Uncle Ralph gave a young me, a gift I believe he never received from a patriarch. He gave to me a memory that has walked with me over the decades. A gift I wish he had found for himself more permanently than the fleeting people and moments that gave him glimpses of that love.

I was five, perhaps six, and in this romanticised memory, we were driving one of those first Fat Albert vans. He was dressed in what I remember was a yellow, orange, purple brand t-shirt and white kitchen-like scrubs. The van was filled with the acidity and garlicky intense sauce that pervades this memory. As we drove past the War Memorial, turning down Rideau, I looked up him. He looked down at me, in turn, with that ever-infectious smile, sporting an Arab fro’ and that deep black beard that smelled of an Uncle’s warmth and scent of a day’s hard work. In that moment, the gift he gave me was this one, eternal covenant, “I love you, Ricky.”

My sitto, my mother, my Uncle Ernie would repeat this message, but he was the first to gift my remembering with something I wish he had found: I knew I was loved.

I pray that wherever he now founds himself, in whatever shape, wave of energy, elder-presence, he is embraced by that Mystery we call Holy Love.

Life is complicated: we are complicated. Yet, at the end of days, it is love we seek, and he blessed me with Love’s truth. For this eternal gift I weep and celebrate with gratitude for the Uncle he was.

May his memory be eternal.